Coach Boeheim doesn't think the Big Ten would be a good fit for Syracuse

Dennis Nett / The Post-Standard, 2010Jim Boeheim has been coaching at Syracuse since before the Big East was formed in 1979. The notion that Syracuse University could leave the Big East if and when the Big Ten decides to expand is not sitting well with longtime men's basketball coach Jim Boeheim.

“I don’t think we’ll do well in the Big Ten. It’s possible, but I don’t think we’d do well at all. I just don’t see how Syracuse or Rutgers fits in with Iowa and Illinois," Boeheim told The New York Times' Pete Thamel.

In addition to threatening longtime Big East basketball rivalries like Syracuse-Georgetown, Coach Boeheim believes a move to the Big Ten would hurt recruiting efforts. “Say a couple schools go to the Big Ten, who’s to say a New York City kid would want to go there? There’s no logical reason for that kid to want to do that," he said.

ESPN broadcaster Sean McDonough, a Syracuse alum, also hopes to see the Orange stay put in the Big East. “I think the Big East has become the best basketball conference in the country,” McDonough told Your News Now. “There’s so much great history and tradition and rivalries, you’d hate to lose all that.”

At the BCS meetings in Arizona last week, Big Ten Commissioner Jim Delany said the conference will not make a decision on whether to expand until December at the earliest.

Big East teams Syracuse, Rutgers, Pittsburgh, and Connecticut have been named as possible targets for the Big Ten. If any of them decide to make the move, money would be the primary motivation - the television payout for Big Ten teams is almost triple for football programs than in the Big East.